Fault, configuration, accounting, performance and security (“FCAPS”) systems have long been recognized to play a role in a management of communication networks, ensuring their availability, performance, and dependability under a wide array of operational conditions. Fault detection and localization represents a component of the FCAPS providing an ability to continuously monitor and assess the health of a network, and to accurately and proactively discover potential problems. While traditional wired networks have benefited from advances in fault detection technologies, fault detection in mobile ad hoc networks (“MANETs”) (also referred to as ad hoc networks) remains largely a matter of art rather than engineering, despite the important role such ad hoc networks occupy in defense, critical emergency response, and other life-sustaining support areas.
Fault detection and localization in ad hoc networks is significantly more challenging than in static networks due to several characteristics thereof. The ad hoc networks generally have very limited bandwidth available for network management activities, higher prevalence of faults due to adverse operational environments, and larger variability of conditions due to mobility and ad hoc organization. These constraints often limit the adoption of traditional fault managers in ad hoc environments. Additionally, fault detection procedures specifically designed for ad hoc networks are hard to maintain and prone to fragility when facing even minor modifications or adaptation.
While this might be acceptable in some stable, traditional networks, these are obstacles in the environment of the ad hoc networks. First, at this technological stage, the basic technologies of the ad hoc networks are still rapidly evolving, which often trigger redesign and refactoring on FCAPS components and dependent systems. Second, expert knowledge and understanding of the operations and maintenance of ad hoc networks remains scarce due to newness of the area and the difficulty of the problem. Also, interactions and dependencies between ad hoc network elements are more complex and difficult to predict because each communication node often includes router capabilities and the nature of the topologies is inherently unstable.
Fault detection and localization represent important network management activities that enable networks to operate in a dependable manner, while maintaining network performance and availability. Despite its importance, fault detection and localization in the ad hoc networks remains difficult due to the challenging nature of such networks, which have now become substantial hindrances for operating the same. Among the chief obstacles facing fault detection in the ad hoc networks are the limited available bandwidth for collecting measurements, inherent centralization of traditional methods unsuitable for ad hoc networks, and fragility of fault models facing variable network conditions and network reconfigurations. Accordingly, what is needed in the art is a system and method for fault estimation and detection that overcomes the deficiencies in the present solutions.